The Grown Up
by Smidy
Summary: Amy was laughing when Rory fell.


_AN: So, this is my devastated reaction to the news that the Ponds are being written out. I swear, if their ending is not heartbreakingly beautiful, I'm going to find Steven Moffat and kick him in the shins. _

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><p>They were running away from a faceless horde when it happened.<p>

Dodging and weaving around giant rocks and low lying outcrops, Amy and the Doctor were grinning maniacally at each other, embracing the flight and the chase and the sheer brilliance of experiencing it _together_.

Amy was laughing when Rory fell.

He yelled, and instinctively stretched out a hand before crumpling into the dirt, being instantly smothered by their pursuers.

And then he was dead. Again. Again.

Of everything, his last thought, scurrying across his resigned mind, centred on definitions. Was it still called _deja vu_ if something happened more than twice?

Amy stopped laughing then. Stopped breathing for a bit. Stopped moving long enough for the Doctor to hang his head, steel his heart, barrel her into the TARDIS and fly away.

Again.

Except this time, she did not cry, nor scream, not claw at the Doctor and beg him to return. This time, she was sufficiently removed from the moment and could finally grasp the absurdity of the situation.

And she resumed laughing.

The Doctor, leaning heavily on the console glanced up, but she ignored him.

She couldn't stop, her giggling escalating into peals of laughter that wracked her whole body and forced her to lean against the wall for support. I mean, really, _come on_.

Their faceless attackers had actually been _literally_ faceless; mangy, knotted hair covering the entire surface of their heads, with their equally hairy bodies cementing their likeness to a particularly wild gerbil.

The giant rocks and low lying outcrops had been obnoxious shades of orange and, according to the Doctor's introductory monologue upon their arrival at the planet, were named after notorious B-grade celebrities from 21st century Earth. The instructions that the Doctor had charged Amy with in order to relocate the TARDIS upon their return had been thus: 'Remember, she's parked smack bang in the middle of an unfortunate boulder named _Khloe Kardashian, _and the pointy, frail-looking _Paris Hilton_ outcrop.' She had to admit, she remembered purely because it sounded like an extremely popular sex tape.

And that wasn't even _mentioning_ the striking similarities that Rory's demise had with Mufasa's death in _The Lion King_. All that was needed was a shady Scar-like character cackling above Rory's trampled body and the addition of tails and manes to the Doctor and Amy's person and they had practically recreated it.

So yeah, she laughed. So hard she almost started crying.

And then, suddenly, she _was_ crying.

She slid down to the ground and the Doctor stood, in the face of his 950-odd years of experience, completely and utterly lost.

Finally, she stopped, and, underscored by her strange, ghostly half-smile, the Doctor and Amy locked eyes.

They discussed and apologised and lamented and laughed and remembered and asked and pleaded.

All in silence.

He hesitated, knowing what would happen, desperately putting it off for second after second. And then he shook his head, and sighed.

She nodded, and then _it_, that indefinable thing that drew him to people, that made him take them away, treasure them, learn from them and love them, disappeared. She looked at him like a stranger and began to slowly walk down the corridor, away from the console room.

'Take me home,' she said, to no one in particular and No One In Particular, masquerading under the face of the Doctor, obliged. 

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><p>He landed the TARDIS in her old room with the blue walls - her house with Rory was obviously out of the question, as is any reconciliation with River - and just like before, they sat on her bed, side by side, and she stared at the place where her wedding dress once resided.<p>

'I'm going to be a widow tomorrow,' she said.

He knew this conversation.

'Do you often make it a habit to be places where you're not wanted?'

He sat and he took it.

'I'm scared, you know, and alone. Alone in the Universe. It's made me think about what I really want. _Who_ I really want.'

He closes his eyes. She's purposefully hurting him. He knows what she means, _who_ she means, and the duplicitous nature of this altercation, the pointed change of meaning behind her recycled words is torturing him.

But then, he muses, he's always purposefully hurting her. All of them. His excuse, that he never _means_ for it to happen, is eclipsed by the simple fact that _knows_ it's going to happen. It always happens. It's inevitable.

So he has to choose – he can either be purposefully destructive with innocent, glorious people or unfathomably stupid. Neither appeal.

She levels her blank stare somewhere around the base of his neck, hands folded in her lap. This time there is no cheeky glint in her eyes, no sneaking hand on his inner thigh, no laughter and danger in her voice. Only regret.

'In one word, Doctor,' she starts, and this is the end, 'in one word even _you_ can understand - '

She pauses, ' - Leave.'

He stands and walks quietly to the TARDIS. He doesn't look back, out of respect, out of his irrepressible, unconquerable love, and he flies away.

He sees her again, even though she doesn't realise he's there. He comes sometimes and watches her, when his companions are sleeping or exploring or off somewhere comprehending.

Over these times, he watches her pack her things into boxes, burn her memorabilia detailing their lives together and cook spinach with every meal.

Her outrageous skirts and her Kiss-O-Gram outfits find their way to the nearest charity and she cuts her glorious long red hair to a more conservative length.

She reconciles with her Aunt Sharon, admits to the wild fancies of her youth and moves back to Scotland, where everything that was exotic and lovely and wild about her, blends, and eventually dies.

The last time he sees her, she's wearing normal clothes, living in a normal house and replacing pictures of Rory with pictures of a normal man with a normal smile and a normal personality that writes itself across his normal face.

And then he leaves forever. Because he doesn't want to see this. He can't see this. He can't reconcile it with what he remembers and what he loves.

He is not merely obsolete now, but entirely non-existent.

Amelia Jessica Pond has grown up. 


End file.
